The Search for Yaser Abdel Said (Part 50)

CHAPTER 50:

HOLLY GOODHEAD

What in the Devil was Stockton Bonds doing in Gaza? He didn’t belong in the Land that God forgot and the Devil remembered. He was a decrepit old man! He was supposed to be retired—on half-pay, playing chess with Sherlock Holmes in some rest home with Doctor Watson taking his pulse every half-hour.

Good grief! He had more wrinkles in his face than a kennel full of Shar-Pei. He was old enough to have been best man at Mickey Rooney’s first wedding. And what was he doing wearing a chauffeur’s uniform? Was he driving the SUV? It didn’t seem possible. Who would have hired him? He didn’t need the work. It didn’t make sense. Was he spying on the Sheikh? Something wasn’t cricket here. The ten-year-old smelled a rat…

He pressed as close to the side of the limo as he could. He wanted to hear what was being said. He wished he had brought the shopping bag with the gun wrapped in the towel but it was too late for that now.

“We’ve got to be careful,” warned Duldul. “If Hamas catches on to what we’re doing we’ll be worse off than Nick Berg and Daniel Pearl ”

“Who?” said Bonds.

“Berg and Pearl,” said Duldul.

“You worry too much,” said Bonds. “It will kill you quicker than a steel-rimmed bowler traveling at a hundred miles an hour.”

“Just the same…” mumbled Duldul, “I don’t want to end up like either of them.”

Bonds ignored the donkey master’s fears. “I went to the hotel and asked for Piffy,” he said. “The manager let me into his room. I found enough phony ID to get Andy Capp into Number 10 Downing Street and Mahmoud Ahmadinejad into Benjamin Netanyahu’s wine cellar. This Piffy chap has more aliases than Eve. His closets were full of kid’s clothes, preteen stuff—brand new, right off the rack, like he intended to outfit The Brady Bunch. Do you have any idea of what he might have been up to?”

“It’s like I told you,” said Duldul. “He’s a ten-year-old boy and he’s got some very powerful friends.“ He rubbed the side of his head with his heavily bandaged right hand. He was thinking of Wheatley W. Wheatley and St. Anthony.

“Absurd,” said Bonds. “He’s a middle-aged American private eye. I’ve met him. He’s Casper Milquetoast. He was hired by a bunch of drunks in a bar to track down Yaser Abdel Said. He shot an Asian in the basement of a Madrassas in London”

“Well, if you intend to take him back to England, I don’t want any part of it,” said Duldul.

“It hasn’t been decided yet,” said Bonds. “We may be able to solve our problem right here in Gaza if we use a little discretion.”

Duldul glanced over his shoulder. He had caught a flash of something from the corner of his eye…a flutter of movement. The smile on his face froze. Perhaps he had glimpsed Piffy. “Somebody’s coming,” he muttered.

Bonds fumbled for a cigarette. “Act innocent,” he said.

Duldul gestured at the shadows creeping across the compound “Well, I’ve got to talk to the Sheikh,” he said. “Say hello to your wife and kids. I’ll see you again one of these days.”

“Cheerio,” said Bonds.

Cheerio thought Piffy? Cheerio?

Duldul turned away from Agent Six-and-seven-eights and started for the rear of the 18-passenger SUV.

It wouldn’t have looked good for Piffy to be caught lurking where he was so he started for the front of the vehicle. He kept his eyes on the ground as they passed. He couldn’t shake the image of Jack Elam sneaking up on the Duke with a foot-long bowie knife in his hand.

If anybody had ever given him the creeps, it was Duldul—the rat-bag had drugged him, stuffed him in an empty jar of cooking oil and had placed his head on Prince Chauncey’s chopping block in a dirty little stable just a few blocks from the Osama bin Laden Madrassas for Girls. It had been a terrifying experience. Only the arrival of puppy dog, St. Anthony and Wheatley W. Wheatley had saved him from joining Anne Boleyn and Robespierre. But Duldul would never recognize the boy in the dress and the wig as little Bernard Piffy. He would think he was a little girl. Still…

And then Piffy was at the front of the limo.

Bonds eyed the ten-year-old. “Well, little girl,” he smiled. “What can I do for you?”

Piffy swallowed. “The Sheikh says he wants you to drive us to the beach,” he said.

“Well, I just might do that,” smiled Bonds. “Do you have a can of petrol I can borrow? It will take approximately 100 liters. Do you know how much that is? It’s quite a lot. Do you think you can get in one can? You’ll need some money. Do you have a credit card?”

Piffy grinned. He couldn’t help but like the old rascal. Sure, he had killed more men than Mike Hammer and Shell Scott combined but he had charisma, never worked up a sweat; was always in control. He was like Peter Gunn. Guys like Bulldog Drummond and Milo Milodragovitch could have learned from him.

He was so suave, so debonair; he could have charmed the pants off a busload of lesbians headed for an anti-Hooters convention. He had put the plomb in aplomb. He made the great Casanova look like Jethro Bodine. He was Bonds—Stockton Bonds. He had savor faire. He could make a little girl’s knees tremble.

“Did anybody ever tell you, you looked like Holly Goodhead?” said Bonds.

Dr. Holly Goodhead? Oh, my! Dr. Holly Goodhead of Moonrakerr? Piffy blushed. His knees trembled. At that moment he was more ten-year-old than he would have liked and more little girl than he would ever have been willing to admit.

“Yes, really,” said Bonds. “You do.”

“No sir,” stammered Piffy. “Nobody has ever told me that.” Holly Goodhead! Really? Wow!

Wait a minute! Wait a minute! What was this? He had better get a grip on himself! One little compliment and he was acting like Joanie Cunningham on her first date with Chachi! This couldn’t be happening to him—could it? He was a ten-year-old boy—or at least a middle-aged man in the body of a ten-year-old boy.

Maybe it was the dress he was wearing. Maybe the ten-year-old body was taking control of the middle-aged mind. And maybe the dress was taking control of the ten-year-old boy! If he weren’t careful he would say something stupid. Or worse yet—he would pee in his panties! He looked at the ground. When he glanced up, Bonds winked at him.

Piffy blushed. He thought he would die! “I’ve got to go!” he said. And he turned and ran—yes, he ran, he ran as fast as he could to the rear of the limo where the Sheikh was talking to Duldul. He squeezed past the former donkey master without so much as an excuse me and raced up the steps into the limo.

Duldul stared after the ten-year-old. He scratched his head. There was something odd about that child.

“Well, if you can’t get back in time for the venture, I will understand,” said Sheikh al-Kabibble.

Piffy sat down beside Fatima. He was flushed and his heart was hammering.

“Are you okay?” asked Aisha.

Piffy nodded toward the Sheikh and Duldul. “What are they talking about?” he asked.

“About Niagara Falls,” said Fatima.

“Niagara Falls?” said Piffy. It didn’t make sense.

“Uh-huh,” said Fatima. “Niagara Falls.” She was rocking back and forth, trying to watch two TVs at the same time—both were carrying reruns of Hamas Mouse

“That’s ridiculous!” said Piffy. “Niagara Falls is a million miles away from here. I thought we were going to the beach?”

“We are,” said Aisha. “They weren’t talking about Niagara Falls, they were talking about Niagara. It’s something you get in a drugstore.”

“Oh,” said Piffy. Whatever.

The Sheikh climbed into the limo and shut the door. He looked at Piffy. “Did you tell the chauffeur to drive us to the beach?” he asked.

”Yes,” said Piffy. “But he’s such an old man. I don’t think he hears very well.”

What else could he say? He couldn’t remember if he had said anything at all to Bonds about going to the beach—any beach—he had become so flustered. What on earth had come over him? It was like the time Darla had called him Elvis Presley. His knees had trembled and he had said a lot of stupid things. But this wasn’t quite the same. It was different…it was scary.

“Well,” said al-Kabibble, “let’s get the camel out of the stable.” He squeezed past the girls to get to the driver’s compartment. As he passed Piffy his hand lingered on the ten-year-olds knee.

Piffy pressed against Fatima.

“Watch it!” growled Fatima. It wasn’t every day a nine-year-old got to watch two episodes of Hamas Mouse at the same time.

Piffy bit his lip.

Al-Kabibble had to tap on the partition to get the driver’s attention. “To the beach, Jeeves,” he said. “I believe you know the way.”

“Jeeves?” said Piffy.

Al-Kabibble smiled at his girls. “I have a genuine English chauffeur,” he boasted. “They are the very best. Duldul found him for me.”

Uh-huh…Duldul. Piffy could believe that. Bonds…Duldul…there wasn’t much missing. They were up to something and that something had to do with the adult Bernard Piffy. It did not bode well for his little masquerade.

The Sheikh had to squeeze past his girls to get to the SUV’s bar. Piffy gave him as much room as he could by crowding against Fatima.

The precocious nine-year-old did not take kindly to this second invasion of her private space. “Watch who you’re shoving!” she squawked. Apparently Krista was no longer the Christ child.

The Sheikh tapped a swizzle stick against a champagne glass. “Well, children,” he announced, “it’s time for prayers. Did you remember to bring your prayer rugs?”

Of course, no one had—there hadn’t been time and the Sheikh knew it. But the limo came well equipped for prayer and al-Kabibble quickly produced a variety of prayer rugs from a console beneath the bar and soon the children were down on their knees for Dhuhr.

While they prayed, or pretended to pray in Piffy’s case, Stockton Bonds got the limo in gear and soon the 18-Passenger SUV was gulping petrol and headed for the beach.

By the time Dhuhr was over, or maybe it was Asr—even al-Kabibble had lost track of the time by then—Agent Six-and-seven-eights had parked the limo alongside a rambling beach house in a remote stretch of the Mediterranean coast several mile south of Gaza City.

The Sheikh herded his girls out of the limo and into the beach house. A feast of sorts had been prepared. There was Jihad Cola for the girls and black Kumiss for the Sheikh. And there were pastries and a fruit salad and a giant TV showing reruns of the great Ahmadinejad’s latest speech.

After a third Jihad Cola and a quarter pound of pineapple Piffy had to go to the bathroom in the worst way. But the house was an old house and there were no indoor facilities. He would have to use the lavatory in a small building at the edge of a wood forty or fifty yards back from the beach. He shrugged. Okay, the walk would do him good.

He looked in on Stockton Bonds as he passed the front of the limo. Agent Six-and-seven-eights was curled up on the front seat of the driver’s compartment. He was sound asleep. Piffy still couldn’t believe the shriveled up little old man had made him feel as silly and as vulnerable as a ten-year-old girl at a Jonas Brothers concert. What had come over him? He was too young for the onset of the menses. What the hell had bint Marwan done to him? It was too absurd for words!

The lavatory smelled worse than it looked and that was the best that could be said for it. There wasn’t any toilet paper and the mirror was cracked in three places. He tried to shoo the roaches from the toilet seat but it was a losing battle. They were as determined a set of rascals as he had ever encountered and he soon ran out of patience. Okay, if that’s the way they wanted to play the game…

He was reminded of a sign in a latrine at Camp Lejeune: “We aim to keep this place clean. Your aim helps too.” Okay, he would be an artillery officer… ready…aim…fire! The roaches didn’t seem to mind.

He finished, pulled up his panties, looked in the cracked mirror—was his face on straight? Did it matter? He was only ten-years-old. He stepped out into a hazy sunset.

And there was Duldul and two of the largest mujahideen he had ever seen!

The former donkey master clamped a hand over Piffy’s mouth. “Don’t say a word, little girl, if you know what’s good for you,” he warned.